and regiments, with here and there an exception, should be raised for the infantry, the field officers, when they are to be organized into battalions, to be appointed by the War Department. The time, however, up to which it is allowable for such volunteer organizations to be formed will shortly expire, and we shall be forced then to await the slow process of having all this material to report for enrollment at the camps of enrolling officers, then assigned to organizations. This will greatly retard the getting up of this material and fitting it for the field. I find no objection to requiring that all men of the ages indicated should be enrolled, but suggest that they be allowed to organize themselves into commands in the manner stated above-in other words, extending the time during which that privilege shall be allowed them. The difference is this: By the one method we have a comparatively few men engaged in gathering this material by a compulsory process, with the risk of its being grouped in organizations not of their own choosing; by the other we can have a large number of active and experienced men who have seen service, for they may be had from the armies in the field, sweeping the country for every available recruit, with the assurance that he has the right to choose his companionship. These companies thus raised might be distributed over the surface of the department for the purposes indicated above, and subjected to drill and discipline until the existing disorders had been reduced or put down. In the mean time they might be organized into regiments, brigades, and DIVISIONS, and as soon as practicable concentrated into camps and held for any service required. I beg to call your special attention to this matter, as with the license asked for and the aid of the department commander the whole of the available military resources of the department would be speedily brought into the service.

I send this by my young friend, Mitchell, who by some accident has been left without a commission, and whose claims to the attention of the Government I beg leave to bespeak.

I remain, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

L. POLK,

Lieutenant-General.

[First indorsement.]

General Bragg for consideration and remarks.

J. D.

[Second indorsement.]

MAY 18, 1864.

Respectfully returned to His Excellency the President.

The experience of the past does not encourage a hope of success in obtaining more men by the process of volunteering. Men unwilling to serve thus obtain delay and keep out of service. The proper remedy is in a vigorous administration of the Conscript Bureau.

BRAXTON BRAGG,

General.

[THIRD indorsement.]

JULY 13, 1864.

Noted. General Bragg's views concurred in.

J. A. S.